This is a really interesting question. I agree with the earlier posts that everyone has at least a little bit of racism in them. Even the most open minded people cannot know as much about the life and struggles of other races as much as they do of their own. This is not intentional racism or hatred of other race, which is a common connotation of racism; it is just a part of life. A person can dedicate their life to getting to know another race but in my opinion if you are not living it firsthand you can never get the full experience; you will always be getting the translated version from experience to words. This inexperience and lack of knowledge will lead to gaps in the information that will be filled in and often come back out as racism.
I decided to comment on this because it is very similar to the thoughts I was having in class today when Sam’s old TA was telling us about his trip to Haiti. I am not saying that it is racism. I don’t really know what it would be called but what you are talking about I would not day is racism. I would say it is more of ethnocentrism in that you are seeing your own culture as right and better than others. You are seeing that your country with all of these resources and money as the best way to accomplish things, and maybe it is, but maybe other countries don’t see it that way and they think that they will be able to accomplish more doing it their way. What I connected this to in class today was when the TA was telling us about all of the non-profit organizations and how what they were doing was the wrong way to do it. he explained his point and why he thought that he had a better way of doing things, but who is he to say what is right? To me it seemed as if he was putting down all of the efforts these organizations are making and saying all of their efforts are going in the wrong direction. When a girl in class said that there are organizations working from within and doing what he said was the right thing he found a flaw in that saying that they could not drill wells where they were. So if water should not be given to them because it doesn’t build their economy but they cannot create wells, then where is the water supposed to come from? It seemed as if no matter what anyone was doing it was not as good as what he was planning to do and that is exactly what he was saying all of the organizations were saying about one another.
I’m not trying to take away from what he is doing in Haiti, but I just think he should take a step back and see what he is saying before he points the finger at these organizations that are supposed to be on the same team as him.

The people who wrote no, not at all to the survey at the end of class just didn’t get it. The person who responded first on this post didn’t get it. It wasn’t a dig at Christians in any way. Sam was just saying that we only see a small portion of what it is really like over there and we shouldn’t take it all at face value. And even more he was saying that just as we see them, they see us. So no he wasn’t saying all of those things about Christians are true, he was saying that is how it is portrayed on their news and TV and it isn’t their fault that is all they know, just as it is not our fault that what we see is all that we know. He was just trying to open our eyes to this so now it is your fault if you chose not to listen.

That country would then attack the entire US because of one class’s actions. No one seemed to respond and I left the class feeling like people were angry at me for offering a different view. What the hell? Isn’t that what we are in class for, to learn and see things different ways, not just to reinforce our already established beliefs? I realized how alone I really was in my thoughts and again got mad about how happy people were in their ignorance.
Finally I came to this class now I realize that all of what Sam was saying was not radical to me at all. To me it was normal and not seeing it this way was radical. But now I understand that to most of the class this was radical. Some people did open up to the idea that it was something they had never thought of before and felt bad for not realizing it, but again I watched hundreds of people not get it.

This semester I am taking another soc class with Eric Silver about deviance. I don’t remember how it came up, but we listened to a few songs about the war and then discussed them. It surprised me how many of these educated people were saying how proud they were of these songs. Even Donny, the TA for soc119, was pumping his fist and clapping in pride of these songs about we’ll put a boot in your ass it’s the American way… what?! Really? All that says to me is we are to stubborn and pig headed to work things out with other countries that we just build up our military and bomb people until they do what we want. It made me ashamed to be American hearing these songs and the things people were saying about it. I finally raised my hand and commented that no countries even attacked us; it would be the same as if our class got together and on our own attacked a country.

I was kind of annoyed at first that this class was talked up so much and made out to be so radical. I have thought all of these things for years even when I was in high school, I was young and stupid, but I still knew that there was another side to things. I knew that there were innocent people in Iraq that were against the war and wanted no part of it, but they had no choice because there were bombs falling in their towns. I knew it was no wonder they wanted to kill all Americans because the Americans they were seeing were George Bush or other political leaders that I didn’t agree with either, but if that was all they knew then how could they not have that image of us and not want to kill us. I thought it was ignorant when people couldn’t see this side of it and eventually withdrew from discussions about it because it just made me so mad how ignorant people could be and not be willing to open their eyes. This really made me believe ignorance is bliss.

I think it is just amazing how society and the human mind work. It is actually ridiculous to think about how we all come together and vote on who should be in power. I don’t care who you are or how much education you have, there is no one person that I feel has the ability to run an entire country. Americans are all self righteous about how we have the best system in place in electing a president and we think we have the right to go into other countries and put our system in place there too. Well here is my take on things… Isn’t it fairer to have a system of government where one person or even better yet a group of people can work together and by their own efforts gain control over the entire country? Isn’t that more natural that the strongest or smartest will rise to the top. If one group is in power and another group has the strength to overthrow them, then isn’t it only fair that they are in power because they earned their position there. In nature the lion did not become the “king of the jungle” through campaigning and one vote for each animal; lions fought their way to the top and proved their right to be there. Isn’t this a natural process and one that we should take on as a country?
But wait. Lions did not become king of the jungle on their own. We as humans gave them this title and when we say they are the top of the animal kingdom we mean the top except for us because of course we are much greater than any other animal on the planet. Or are we? Are we really just hiding in our cities and houses afraid to go out into the real world because we know that the kind of the jungle can and will kill us because they are naturally superior. Or are we superior because we figured out a system to protect ourselves? Is anyone really superior or do we as humans place each other in a hierarchy but really we are all the same and we are all equal as humans as well as all equal as animals. So who are these people that run for president and say they are the best fit to run this country, who are they to think they are better than me at knowing what is best and who am I for falling for it?
While we look at other countries and see all of the flaws within their system, perhaps they are doing the same to us, we are just too self centered to see that. And of course we will never let their rational view from the outside take effect because in order to be in charge here you have to be born here and live here for years so you are fully brainwashed before you may take power. We all say we want change and support our political party by going into a little booth every four years and voting between political mold figure one and political mold figure two. We feel good about doing our part and voting and we go home and watch the states turn a little color on the TV. We get a new president and we believe that our vote decided who it was. How do we know it’s not all just an act? Is my vote really counted, does it matter, do we really live in a state where our rulers are predetermined and we are convinced that we, as a country, chose who is in power. Does our feeling of choice give us greater satisfaction in our leader when he is really doing the same thing anyone else would do?
Who knows? It’s easier to just not talk about it or think about it, just like race.

I only know what I know and I personally could not tell the difference between an Asian and an Asian American at first glance. As Sam talked about earlier in the semester it is just something that we learn or don’t learn through our lives through exposure. I grew up in a small town with no Asians except the one family that owned the Chinese restaurant so I never really had the chance to look at Asians or Asian Americans and learn the differences in features. I would say I may be able to tell if there were obvious cultural differences in clothing, speech, or other social cues that someone was not American but more than that I am clueless.
I have never really thought about it before in class but now that you say it, we really don’t spend much time talking about Asians. I really just clumped that with brow people but the more I think about it, if I was a “brown person” I would be pretty annoyed with this class. I feel like we address so many issues with white people and fear and guilt with race. We talk a lot about slavery and black people that can or cannot trace their history to slavery and other large black and white issues. Most of the time brown people get clumped in with “black and brown people” when now that I think about it seems to be skipping over brown people all together, not just Asians. I do not know much about brown people or what their struggles are but I would think there are much different than that of a black persons. I understand that they are both minority statuses so they often get clumped together but I would think that this class would be the first place that would be recognized and addressed.
I just think about sitting in class after experiencing a life full of unique experiences as a brown person. It would definitely be different from white people who are the majority and essentially don’t have to face discrimination based on their skin color at any point in their lives. They are clueless to any of it and are here to learn more. I would see the black people and know that my fight is so much different from theirs. I don’t identify with slavery and I know my family came here because they wanted to. I am not included in the racist comments about the “loud black girls in the hub” that was texted in by an ignorant classmate nor am I one of the girls that straighten my hair like a white girls, but my hair is not naturally in tight curls either. I would be sitting in class taking in the cultures of so many others, which is fine and what I am here for, but when is it my turn to hear about the struggle of my own people. What about the discrimination that we face.
The stereotype of smart Asians is quite different than ignorant black people so where in our culture did it become okay to clump all minorities together and why is Sam perpetuating this mistake?

Watching this video I had mixed feelings about the situation and how the representatives handled the events. As the boy in the video was talking about the teach in I couldn’t help but feel sort of angry at him for the way he look at it. The university held an event to try to make the situation better and he was saying it was not their place to have a teach in and that they should have done more or other things. I just kept thinking that the University would of course have an event and see how the students responded and engaged in the activity. He said he wants the university to do more but I think he was counteracting that by walking out of the first event. If the university sees that students are walking out and not participating in the events that they hold then they will stop holding events. Even if he thought that it was not the responsibility for the university to organize it he could have spoke about that at the teach in and said that he feels more violated because of their actions. If he just left the university officials would have no idea why and would settle on bad student participation and discontinue their efforts. If he would have spoke out as they were asking maybe he could have made a change in the university’s plan.
He also says it is the responsibility of student organizations to hold the teach in events, but he did not mention any organizations that were planning an event to get the word out about it. If the organizations are not stepping up and holding the events than why is it so bad that the university is. What is the difference of who starts it, as long as it is happening I would think that he would want to get involved and speak up with his ideas.
Overall his withdrawal from the event angers me. If he thought there was a problem there he should have spoke up about it there as that is what it was intended for. Instead he held off and waited to bad talk the university on the news when they have no way of responding or defending their actions. The university would not hold the event if they did not think it would be helpful and were probably hoping to see where to go from there. If there was no feedback from students such as the one in the video then how should they know what to do next?
I am not saying the university did the best they could to combat the racist issues, I just think that the boy in the video was victimizing himself and saying how bad it was and that it needed to change, but he did not do his part to make that change. I think this is often the case when black and brown people look at racism; it is easy to point the finger at white people and say they need to change, but as Sam said for every finger you point, three point back at you. If you are going to cry discrimination, you have to ask yourself if you are doing just as much as you are asking of the white guy next to you.

After I wrote this post I wanted to look more into the issue and I found this video and it makes the same point I am saying. As individuals we need to recognize the discrimination, and as a country we need to pass more legislation to reserve their rights. They have already lost so much as a people; the least we can do is respect their religious traditions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZhcoQ9gyMk

The next time you are at a sporting event of the Chiefs, the Indians, the Redskins, just remember what that really means. To us it may seem like a sign of respect but the best comparison I can think of (as a catholic girl) is someone dressing up as a nun for Halloween. That is sac-religious not respect and the mockery we have made of Indian tradition is the same disrespect.